04/25/00 Paddling Apalachicola River:
After a week of high winds in the Apalachicola Bay Area, I've moved into the Apalachicola National Forest. There's lots of rivers, creeks, streams and small lakes here so I should be able to find some decent paddling somewhere. And hey, for $3 a night how can I go wrong?
This morning I put in at Smith Creek at the end of FR (Forest Road) 124. My watch showed 10am but I think we're in the central zone here so I guess that would really make it 9am. I don't care. My body says its 10am so I'm keeping my watch the same. I'm not getting jet lag without even getting on a plane. We had a tornado watch most of yesterday and that would have certainly put me into another time zone.
Smith Creek is about 50 feet wide with lots of water. The banks are lined with cypress and lots of small oaks. Turning right, I paddled 0.25 miles or so and the oaks got larger with the branches stretching across the water to form a pretty canopy. A little farther on the creek narrowed and then split off into a zillion small channels through a forest of cypress. I picked my way along for a while but since there was no current, I couldn't really determine the main channel. I knew I could keep picking my way forward but was getting skeptical about finding my way back. So, I turned back the other way.
I had difficulty finding the put in on the way back. One of the things I was taught early on in my paddling career was to keep turning around to see where you've been so you'll know what it looks like on the way back. I had taken a waypoint on the GPS and had to get it out to help me find the ramp.
0.50 miles or so in the other direction brought me to the Apalachicola River. Here was a 2+ knot current (ebb tide I think) being helped along by a 5-15 knot wind out of the northwest. The Apalachicola River was about 150 feet wide at this point and lined with mostly live oaks and other hardwoods. Some cypress and pines towered above the hardwoods and a few palms leaned out over the river to grab their share of the sunlight.
I certainly wasn't going to let the wind and current push me downstream so I headed upstream. The river was pretty nice but with the adverse elements I just decided this would be an exercise day of moderately hard paddling rather than a sight seeing or nature trip.
I went poking up a couple of feeder streams that were nice. Around noon I came to what I assume was the Fort Gadsen Creek and followed it for a half hour or so before having lunch and then turning back.
I saw minimal wildlife on this trip. A couple of turtles, a few great egrets and a couple of gray ones.
04/27/00 Paddling Fort Gadsen Creek:
The other day while driving to the put in for Smith Creek I passed over a small creek that looked interesting. Investigating around the bridge revealed no easy access. Looking at the Atlas I was able to track down a nice put in (On SR 65, take first right (across from FR 143 & RR xing) south of Fort Gadsen Creek bridge (2 miles south of Fort Gadsen) then first right to end), a mile farther upstream.
This morning a half dozen bass boats showed up early at Hickory Landing where I'm camped. It was starting to look like a Bass Master's Tournament so that pretty much ruled out Owl Creek even though they were probably headed for the Apalachicola River. So I drove the couple of miles to the put in for the South Prong of the Fort Gadsen Creek.
The South Prong is 40-50 feet wide, tannin colored water, no current and plenty of water. Most of this area seems to be small live oaks clustered tightly together giving a similar feeling as mangrove islands. Large cypress trees are interspersed with the oaks and have large knees protruding nearby from the water.
Either some of these oaks have wider, cypress type trunk bases or there are a different type of cypress here with live oak type leaves. I think there are red cypress and white cypress. If so, I think the ones I've been seeing are the red ones and these smaller trees without knees are the white ones.
I was walking away from the kayak to move the car. I'm on this back water creek in the middle of no where, parked in the middle of a national forest and someone yelled at me and I almost peed myself. Some guy in a canoe with a trolling motor had stopped and wanted to where I was headed. Geeze!
After paddling a little ways I noticed the water flowed back in amongst the trees on both sides, meaning there weren't really any shorelines or banks. I paddled back into a loosely packed forest of small cypress trees with just a few oaks. That was quite a different feeling being surrounded by trees on all sides while still sitting in the kayak. Maneuvering was so tough I broke the paddle down and just used one blade. I didn't paddle too far in. It would be too easy to become totally disoriented paddling around trees and constantly changing directions. I had noted the compass heading as I headed into the trees but even so... Even knowing I had a waypoint at the launch didn't add much confidence, probably because this was my first time for this kind of paddling.
30 minutes of easy paddling brought me to a Y in the creek where I was exiting from the right most fork. Water still went back into the trees as far as I could see. A layer of leaves and small twigs and branches covered much of the water back there, indicating to me no current and no flooding had taken place for some time.
I felt so peaceful and serene paddling down this creek, the only sound for the most part being the thrust of my paddle through the water. Well, there was the occasional roar of a low flying fighter jet, probably out of Pensacola. They were still more useful than those damn jet propelled air boats even if they're almost as annoying. Bright sunshine, no wind and no current left the water calm and flat and a perfect mirror to reflect the trees and sky right back at you.
I passed under the one lane bridge from which I'd first spotted the creek. Paddling along minding my own business I had the bejesus scared out of me by a big splash not 30 feet from me, probably a 5-6 foot alligator hitting the water at the sight of me.
Shortly after that the creek was covered with pollen and narrowing. Finally open water gave way to channels through cypress and oak trees. Not knowing if the waters would open back up or not, I turned around.
Wildlife had been almost non-existent on the way down, a red-headed sap sucker, a mamma duck and 4-5 ducklings and another alligator floating around and that was about it.
I got back to the Y in the river much too early so headed up the left fork, into a 5-10 knot wind. I assume this was Fort Gadsen Creek proper but had a hard time later trying to resolve what I'd seen to the atlas.
Paddling up wind for 30 minutes or so after lunch brought me to a feeder stream. I thought it might be the other end of the South Prong but the GPS said I was 1.7 miles from the launch and that didn't sound right. Not knowing what it was I continued into the wind.
Eventually I ran into the Apalachicola River. My guess I was on the same feeder creek I had started down the other day from the Apalachicola. In fact, I probably had lunch in just about the same spot.
04/29/00 Paddling Owl Creek:
This morning I put in from the Hickory Landing boat ramp onto Owl Creek. I've been camped at Hickory Landing for the past week and there are definitely a number of barred owls in the area lending truth to the creek's name.
Owl Creek is pretty wide for a creek in these parts, measuring 150-200 feet wide in many places. Also unlike many of the other local streams, Owl Creek is not tannin colored but more of a greenish color. Small live oaks and small cypress trees were still the main trees on both sides of the creek though.
Heading north, I passed several fair size coves. While exploring them, you don't have to paddle all the way around them. You can just paddle through the trees right back into the main creek.
45 minutes into the paddle I came across a feeder creek (probably Black Creek) about the same size as Owl Creek. I started down this creek but turned back after going only a short distance. It seemed about the same as Owl Creek and I thought I'd save further exploration until the return trip. I'm glad I did.
A little farther up, Owl Creek narrowed to 60-70 feet and I spotted several 6+ foot alligators. One was on a downed tree, one was swimming out from the cypress trees and one had crawled up on the oddly shaped and curving, wide based trunk of a cypress. With the water going way back into the trees there are no banks for the gators to crawl up on to sun themselves so I guess they have to make do with whatever they can find. I suppose they find sunny spots farther back in the trees.
The creek soon narrowed even farther to 30-40 feet. Even though the shorelines are still the same, things become much more interesting than the wider sections when they're closer together. Then the creek narrowed to 15-20 feet with the main channel still easily recognizable. Looking at the map later on, I think this part of the creek is called Little Owl Creek.
With the creek down to 10 feet wide, there was a lot less room to get around obstacles. Several floating logs blocked the way but moved easily when I pushed my way through. With such a narrow channel, the trees on either side formed a tunnel through the forest.
I was hoping the channel wouldn't narrow any more. I was getting a little nervous because it was becoming a little more difficult to follow the main channel when others were breaking off in different directions. And I was wondering what it would be like trying to find my way back. This was no place to be lost. Then I noticed a solid shoreline on the right and that gave me confidence to go on some more.
Things did deteriorate after that because the channel narrowed even more and then bore off to the left. I wasn't ready to give up the security of knowing I had a shoreline on my right so I called it quits. Too bad because it was really pretty neat back in there.
I figured I'd paddled 6-7 miles but the GPS only showed 2.5 straight miles. No sign of the alligators on the way back and I saw no other wildlife on the trip.